Windows 7 Wish List

I am very excited about Windows 7. In fact, I can’t wait. It can’t happen soon enough. Without flat out admitting it, Microsoft is finally realizing what we, as users, have known all along. Vista delivered far less than expected after a five year wait from the smartest, wealthiest, largest, and savviest software company in the world.

But let’s not look backwards, now is the time to look forwards to a bright future for Windows and its suffering users. Having purchased Vista in March 2007, and being one of its first guinea pigs, here is my wish list for Windows 7 and why.

Windows Movie Maker. As I reported almost two years ago, there still is a major problem with Windows Movie Maker. In the middle of editing (sometimes at the end), a horrible error message “Windows Movie Maker has stopped working.” appears. If you Google the above error message, it is easy to imagine millions of people getting the same error message.

The world of user created video is still in its early years, and in the next decade will fundamentally change the way we consume information and entertainment. Microsoft needs to show us that they are committed to becoming the best damn video creation platform, and that means fixing nagging problems like this one. The option is conceding this critical element of computing to Apple, which I am sure has no problems such as this.

Networking. Networking in Vista is functional, yet it’s not as good as XP. I have two personal examples. My home network has 4 different laptops throughout the household. It is great for trading files between family members. The problem is sometimes (not all the time), Vista cannot see the other computers on the network. Quite often, when I am working on my Vista computer, I like to listen to music on one of the other computers. I have found that if I say two prayers, and chant a mantra to Vista, that 90% of the time Vista will let me listen to my music.

My other big beef is network printing. When I print across the network a one page Word document in XP, it takes less than a minute. With Vista, it takes over 5 minutes. I don’t know why and I really don’t care. I find it unacceptable.

The key point is that networking is important for the operating system, and none of these problems existed in XP. Networking should happen seamlessly, and not something we users wrestle with on a daily basis. So my next Windows 7 Wish List item is to nail down the networking stack this time.

Windows Explorer Is Restarting. A simple search shows that a lot of people have this problem also. In my case, it usually happens when I am trying to choose a file in a dialog box (for example attaching a spreadsheet to an email). The screen whites out, and I get a message that Windows Explorer has failed and is restarting. Then after about 2-3 minutes, it restarts without problem. I have never lost any work due to this problem.

I don’t mind the time loss. It doesn’t happen that often (maybe once a month). The issue is one of confidence. Windows Explorer is the guts of Windows. Restarting Explorer feels like a bandaid. In Windows 7, I wish that they solve this problem at the root, and remove the bandaid.

Notepad. I already documented in a previous blog that Notepad is the same software program we used in Windows 3.1 (circa 1991). Since 1991, so much has changed in the way we live, and the ways and reasons we use our computers. The reality is that it would have been simple for Microsoft to add simple features such as spell check, auto-save, and tag closing (for coders) into Notepad. What did they do instead? Nothing. That’s the problem. We need a sign that Microsoft is committed to improving its product in subsequent versions of its software, not just sitting on its laurels. Microsoft, please add some new features to the parts of Windows that we all use and love.

Performance. On top of it all, Vista is slow. Vista needs more memory, more disk space, and more processing power in order to achieve the exact same task as XP. It’s not because there are more features, it is just larger, bulkier and clunkier than its older brother. So let’s add another line to the check list that Windows 7 will be faster than XP. After all, our computers have more memory, more disk space, and multi core processors, is it too much to ask that the computers are a little faster?

The Next Big Thing. Last but not least is the NEXT BIG THING. This is my most important wish list item. In fact, if Microsoft can check off this item, they needn’t worry about the others.

The reason why Windows is the dominant operating system in the world is because Bill Gates had a vision. A computer on every desk. Later that vision included the internet and in many ways helped drives the internet’s adoption. But alas, that vision has come and passed. We need a new vision and Windows 7 needs to embody that vision.

Vista was bad in its execution, but it was even worse in vision. After two years of Vista, Microsoft has in essence relegated the visionary role to Apple. That needs to end. Windows 7 needs to show all of us Microsoft’s vision for how computing will continue to better our lives. Now that would be a home run!

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112 thoughts on “Windows 7 Wish List”

I had a major problem with Wndows 7 64-Bit edition could no find no drivers etc. so went back to the 32 bit version. Gradually drivers are appearing, Creative now have a driver for Sound Bllaster X-Fi, I can get my Canon IP6000D printer to print though it still won’t load the full set of drivers. My HP Scanner does work but again won’t load the full driver set. So my thoughts are that it is a bit early to give Wndows 7 a real home user test. I opened Window Media Plaer 12 which seemd ok but ever since the computer won’t shut down properly. I am very glad I added Windows 7 to a second partition because I can still operate in Vista 32 which I love. When Microsoft get all the glithces out I believe Windows 7 will be superb until then I am back to Vista

The biggest grip with vist is the dam confirmation of almost every task. It is what Apple decided to attack first against MS and Vista and they are correct. They have made Vista way to cautious. Windows 7 takes alot of this do you confirm crap out and actually based on a proven Windows server 2008 kernal using a Vista GUI. Hold on while I confirm I want to make this post to Vista……

I’ve just put windows 7 beta on my main computer,(was running xp) this is outstanding, its everything you could want, ok so its only been days, but i’ve played with it so much and it is so good, i would never even dream of buying an os, but i will this.
My advice is give it a go.

if you want a quick check as to how windows 7 operates download and install the beta version that is avaialable from microsoft, i did and dumped my vista that same day, even the beta is better than vista. ie still restarts but other than one driver problem it works great

Just a few last words on Windows 7, while I used it it ran great and it responded fast, quick to enter the internet and it actually worked great with all my hardware. Now this is only a 1.2 processor with 2048 mb of memory and a 128mb video card which is the bottom of the scale for this program but it react’s faster then that of XP.

Short Note, I have ran all microsoft programs on this computer to try and I found that XP was the best for 2 reasons, I did not have to buy modern day hardware and the other was that all my software worked look it should.
I also tried Vista Ultimate and I ended up with hardware and software issues.
I just downloaded and installed Windows 7 on this computer but I have run into a problem that I have never seen. The program will install (OS)all missing drivers and windows update will install, Office 2007 and finally 1 of the 3 virus programs will install with no issues, here is the problem that I have ran into and believe me it is weird. the program starts good, runs good and actually boots and works pretty good but after 2 days of running it will not boot back up and it states (Illegal Partition), after running into this problem 3 times in a row in a 7 day spand I decided to just go back to XP, so far no issues.
Can anybody try to explain as to why this is happenning and why after 2 days.
This computer has gone from Windows 98SE,2000, XP,Vista and Finally W7 all clean install, W7 has been the only one that has had an issue of this kind and after installing all Windows and secondary programs this is the first time that I have seen this. I honestly think that this program could end up working pretty good, Nowthere could had been a problem when I copied the ISO Windows 7 files unto the DVD, But I also would think that it should had shown corrupted files and then why would it work for 2 days.
Thank You

I have both vista, xp, even some windows ME,talk about old windows 95 b. I find all very good. The only vista issue I have is with older hardware I have I have alot printers that can run 98 on up there good ones. There all in one. I like vista I just keep working around the hardware issues. The only beef I got with vist is software issues. I have cd books of software and it say incompatble with 99%. That is pros and cons of upgrading. My new laptop is an IBM Lenovo 2.0 gig with 4 gig of ram came with 1 and vista home. It crashed the first week the master restore didn’t work. I installed Vista ultimate and runs great now.
I do recomed vista, and also XP. There both good and reliable. I know that with dell you can downgrade to xp if you special order.

Yes, let’s move back to the dark ages. With people like some of you we may not have even have the candle invented because you would have been satisfied with going to bed when the sun went down. Advancing in the world is what makes the world go round. You stay with 2000 and oh by the way, bought any new software lately.

There is no seventh listed and it is WINDOWS 7! No wonder people don’t go to new operating systems, no common sense. Try all operating systems eg: O2, linux, unix, mac, and windows.
Once you go there you pretty much have very little problems with windows operating systems.
In fact most pc’s are built for windows.
Just don’t put the blame in someone elses lap, fix it or get me to fix it.

I inherited a 6 months old Compaq desktop from my daughter – they gave up on it as it ran awful. Slow to boot, slow to browse, slow to do anything. They thought it was a bad machine. Formatted the HD and installed XP SP3 and behold it now outperforms their quad core superbox.

BTW – the box I got is Celeron 3Mhz with 1.5 megs memory. Hardly a blazer! If W7 turns out to be another cpu/memory hog, I might end up a complete LINUX household. And Microsoft will have lost another customer. By the way I will never pay thousands of dollars for an underpowered Apple!

I find this “wish list” very hard to respond to without going into a rant.

chengrob puts an irrelevancy like Windows Movie Maker at the top of his list when further down he tells us that networking does not work properly and that Explorer keeps restarting (which takes 2 to 3 minutes!!!) What is he on?

I am seriously worried now, having just placed the order for a Vista laptop, that I may have made a big mistake.

And what is this about?
“My other big beef is network printing. When I print across the network a one page Word document in XP, it takes less than a minute. With Vista, it takes over 5 minutes.”

Less than a minute? I’d expect 10 pages in less than a minute in the days of Windows for Workgroups!

And why does he want them to mess about with Notepad? It is close to perfect as it is. Whenever developers add “features” they remove the point of the program. Notepad is a simple text editor that does not format and so is a close to perfect HTML editing tool (Textpad is better, but you do have to pay for it)

And in 5th position comes performance. As usual, until you have kicked all of the useless crud into touch the new op system runs like a dog on a machine that makes a Cray of the 70s look like a pocket calculator.

If some of you love Macs so much why are you even trying vista? Go on your Mac forum and brag more about it. To those of you that are switching to Mac, go for it. Then go check out the limited supply of software and many of the problems you run into on the net. At least we won’t have to listen to you complain anymore. Bye Bye to you.

Win 7 is still in beta so now is the time to complain about all the things you don’t like and let MS know about what you would like.
Be positive about it rather than just winge.
One of the great things about the beta is that there is the ability to tell MS exactly what you think just by clicking on the “Send Feedback” text string or the icon on desktop.

To all users Microsoft products Old (from 1980? Please correct me if I am wrong. to present 2009.) Just a little things that I would like clearing up once and for all. 1. Was Microsoft BASIC ever finished? (I believe NOT!)
2. If the answer to number is no. Does anybody know of any Microsoft Software, that was ever fully finished?

My Point being if they cannot, produce a finished product. All those waiting for windows 7, you are going to end up like windows 95 users now! obosolete….
I have a friend who suggested the new windows be called: Windows Boarded Up!
Note: I make this point. Windows is only interface to DOS, without DOS there woud be no windows.

I am certainly not rooting for a monopoly to continue it’s monopoly that was built on illegal practices, piracy, patent infringements, unethical and predatory practices.

That said, as you have commented notepad may be old and outdated, but it never was and still is not intended to be a word processor, it is a simple text editor, and that is all it should be.

Wordpad could use some improvements.

As for windows movie maker it is a joke, always was, and always will be.

It isn’t a matter of conceding that to Mac, as it has never even come close to competing with MAC when it comes to video editing and creation. Some things are best left to people and programmers who have an understanding of good video software.

Microsoft is confused about how to create an operating system, they have been for decades. They simply don’t seem to grasp that these things should not be “tied” to the OS, they should be options that can be added, and or completely removed, when I say completely I do mean completely, not just removing the shortcut and hiding the app from the user, but the ability to completely and totally remove things that a person doesn’t want.

They should not be installed by default, they should not be setup with predefined settings, these things should be options. Options that are available if a person wants them, and not just shoved down your throat whether you want them or not.

Simply put, they do not offer choice, instead they force on you what they want you to have, half functioning, buggy apps that only work with proprietary formats designed with one sole purpose, to keep the sheeple locked in, locked down, and completely dependent on their buggy crap.

Windows Vista was/is the beginning of a modular operating system, they kind of blew it in the impementation.

What they have in Windows 7 is the opportunity to finally create a truly modular system, and if they do it right, they will have created an actual operating system, rather then a collection of inter-weaved garbage that is tied into the kernel with hooks that break other components if removed.

If they don’t get it right this time, they will continue to loose market share.

Yes they are loosing huge segments of the computing market. 30% of the netbooks on the market were shipped with alternative operating systems. That has never before happened since the IBM clone hit the markets.

These little netbooks are a huge success, and 30% of them are not shipped with windows. 😉 Microsoft is nervous, worried and scrambling to stop it from continuing. The sad thing is they won’t do it the right way, they will continue with their lock em, lock em down, break compatibility with everyone else mentality that is and will be their undoing.

They are and will continue a downward slide, until they figure out that their old ways of doing things, won’t work in the future, it works for now, and will somewhat continue to work for a while, but in the long run, it is a failing business model.

Thanks, Tom. I couldn’t have stated it better. I’ve been building computers for over 25 years and Vista is the best OS I’ve use. Many Vista bashers haven’t acutually used it. If they did then they’d be won over. The author of this article, chengrob, is also highly suspect. I disagree with nearly every negative statement he made about Vista including networking. I network 3 computers and never have had a single instance where the other computers weren’t recognized or I couldn’t print or listen to music or watch a video. It’s sad that he calls himself an expert if he couldn’t figure out such simple tasks. I’d kill myself if I had to go back to using XP. The XP diehards just don’t know a good thing when they see it. And the guys that got new laptops with Vista that they claim just sits gathering dust, well, that couldn’t be more pathetic. Give me a break. The learning curve isn’t that difficult. Even old dogs can eventually learn new tricks if they try. But they act like they have to learn Chinese. And Vista isn’t slower than XP, I think it’s much faster burning music and video, booting up and it’s more intuitive. And you don’t have to press start to turn it off! It saves steps doing those mundane everyday functions like making file folders, seeing what’s on the desktop when it’s minimized and search. Video and gaming is also superior with DX10. Media Center is standard and once I stopped bashing it and learned how to use it, it’s a blast! And the extra features, like the side bar is standard and works better than the XP version, I can’t live without it now. I still use XP when I compose music because I have several thousand dollars invested in the software. But I’d kill myself if I had to go back to using XP for gaming and mainstream tasks. I’ve been using Vista32 since it came out and then I built a Vista 64 for gaming and couldn’t be happier. It stomps XP’s a**! My suggestion to the naysayers is to stop being pussies and man-up. Vista is far better than XP. Argument over.

From time to time I log onto PC Pitstop for one reason. To read the comments from all you nuts who seem to do nothing but compain about Vista, and now you have Windows 7 to complain about, and rant on how great XP is and from the way you go on it sounds as if you would be content if they never, ever developed another OS. Just give me my XP and I’ll be content forever. Give me a break.

OK, I’ve logged on, read the posts and did I ever get a few laughs.

I was a Vista Beta tester, am now a Windows 7 Beta Tester, and have been a Windows Beta Tester since 1993. My take? Vista was the best they ever came out with. Windows 7, it’s basically Vista. Different interface a little, sure it loads faster and on older machines (for you die hard XP nuts), but open the hood and do some looking and lo and behold what you find is Vista with some tweaking.

Is that a bad thing? No, Windows is forever evolving, you had might as well get used to it, or shell out a ton of money on go to that other OS. Choice is yours, so quit your bellyaching.

I don’t understand why each time MC comes with something new it is a complete rewrite. What is wrong with improving an exixting program without changing it all together. I’ve had Vista for more than a year now and still cant find anything.

PC builders have resumed offering XP as an alternative instead of pushing Vista as the latest and greatest — says a lot, don’t you think?

I have 5 computers networked at home. One has Vista Ultimate (mine). Other users in the house, after a period of “let’s all hog the sexy new black box with the 24″ widescreen”, rarely bother me now. They have all gone back to their old, reliable XP boxes. Mostly, I believe, because of IE’s bad behaviour. Says something also, don’t you think?

Without any settings of any kind being altered at any time, Vista Ultimate tends to “lose” other machines that are on the network. The missing machine can always be reached by putting its name directly in the address field … it just doesn’t appear in the list under Network. Can’t imagine what that’s all about!

Vista almost routinely refuses to copy/move files on other machines that XP is only too happy to make a pizza with. Certainly says something about XP!

I am hoping that Windows 7 (which will of course be perfect straight out of the box) will be a free upgrade for Vista users. Says something about me, don’t you think?

I think Vista is great and XP is good but the Windows 7 beta I have loaded on my computer seems to have them both beat in speed. So far everything is compatible except for an old game I like. Downside is that there is no Outlook Express or any email client and there is no Windows Movie Maker at least not in the beta version.

I like XP because it is proven, 99% stable and everything I want to runs works without problems.

I like Vista purely because of the eye candy.

Unfortunately, there are some serious file exchange issues with Vista that I just cannot forgive. I dual-boot XP and Vista on a relatively new desktop PC with an Intel Core 2 Duo E6850. In XP, I can transfer a file from my computer over the network to my wife’s in no time. I can then boot into Vista and transfer the same file, but it will take 3-5 times as long.

Not to mention the fact that Vista does not play well with VMWare Server, which prompted me to set up an XP partition again in the first place.

I’ve been using Windows 7 Beta, and it Starts up and shuts down much faster than Vista, Has a task bar which gives you beter acces to programs, and a jump menu to the documents and Items you use most, but still is almost as unstable as Vista, which is still plagued by compatability issues.
The homegroup is only compatible with Vista or Windows 7, so won’t be of any great use.

In short, as a system builder, I’m stocking up on XP, it is the only Windows OS I can depend on.

i run xp and vista os on my pc at firsti was ready to take vista hd and throw it out the window but since sp1 i have had very few problems and xp still has bugs in it to and as a matter of fact it runs alot slower than vista on here i have a quad core q6600 4 gigs of ram on a p5w dh deluxe motherboard and the bottom line is yes vista still needs work but so does xp so it will be allright i will not go back to xp and i dont have any problems with my networking either it recognied everything for me after a little coersion so it can be done just drop the conspiracy theories and really give it a chance sorry i call it like i see it i dont have many problems with it and it is faster.

I forgot to add, look at all the software out there that promises to fix Windows… THERE’S A BOOMING INDUSTRY DEDICATED TO FIXING MICROSOFT’S OS!!
If EVERY car garage became a “specialist Ford repair centre” would you really buy a Ford?
The only thing Microsoft have going for them is that they have the monopoly… and when you’ve got it, it’s improbable for anyone to break.

I use MS OS and a PC for one reason… I can’t afford a Mac! Although if you factor in the cost of upgrading the OS on a PC, virus scanner, firewall, time spent fixing XP/Vista problems (time=money and all that) yadda yadda, a Mac is starting to look like a far better investment!
When have MS ever released an OS that just worked?! Yet every time there’s all this hype about how amazing the next one will be (to distract you from how cack the existing one is).
I have mates using 6 year old macs that have NEVER crashed, NEVER had any virus/malware/etc… and this is a consistent story! They just, well… WORK!
MS will always be chasing Apple, doing it cheaply and badly. It’s the “buy cheap, buy twice” ethos.
MS, you’ve lost me (I can hear the sarcastic sobbing already). The only thing I’ll miss is Flight Sim 🙁

Here we go again. Would the Apple brigade please butt out. We know you don’t like Microsoft and are getting fed up hearing about it.
I have been running Windows since day 1 (yeah I am that old – Windows 2.0 was my first on a x286 machine). XP was the first version that I found that I was really happy with in a corporate network environment -remote desktop was a boon (OK VNC etc was available but XP had it built in).
Vista. What can I say. UAC drives me mad but it is there for a reason – basically to stop idiots blindly downloading all sorts of nasties on their PC (try letting your kids loose one night or the boss’s daughter appearing one weekend when daddie’s working overtime – Monday morning your phone will ring off the hook).
On the good side I have found Vista seems more stable and quicker although boot times seem slower at times. I also like the fact that if I do have an application crash then more often than not the app restarts itself and I lose nothing.
Windows 7. The final beta was only released a few days ago. For gods sake give it a chance. My initial impressions are that is one hell of a lot faster than Vista. Boot time on my laptop is about 1 minute compared to about 5 with Vista (although I think that the slow boot time is more to do with the bloatware put on by the manufacturer although Windows 7 seems to handle that much better – I purely did a straight upgrade from Vista so all the old stuff was still there).
Over the next few months we will be seeing patches and fixes from Microsoft and the manufacturers bringing out new drivers etc. Until then I think we should all sit back a bit and see what happens. If come the end of the year and the retail version is released and turns out to be crap then we can really complain.

I have just loaded win 7 x64 and can find very little difference between it and its windows Vista predecessor. You still have to go through umpteen screens to get where you want to go. It still failed to recognise my XP machine on the network. Simply changing a few things around,changing the way it looks and fixing a few problems does not make this a new OS. Its just a vista service pack for which you will be asked to pay.

@BM
Why the hostility towards those who disagree with your point of view. I have no called anyone here a name such as a “Liar” and do not feel that such comments add to the discourse. If you are happy and satisfied with Microsoft’s products, I am pleased for you and wish you nothing but well. However many of us have either higher expectations or are more demanding and feel that a company with the resources of Microsoft should be able to produce a better and more reliable product. Many of us feel that Microsoft continues to release products that are not fully tested and are not really ready for release, but because they have a driving desire for additional revenue, they would prefer to release yet another “new” untested and unfinished product rather than fix the ones they already have out.

Being a network/pc engineer I have seen the worst of vista. The networking subsystem is unreliable at best. Network domain intergration and functionality is a joke. File security is laughable. I can attack a vista harddisk to a windows xp system and I cannot access it but if I plug the same data into a MAC presto I can access it all without any problem whatsoever.

My final gripe about vista is the update system. I spend half my time removing bugged updates that break various parts.

Why not some basics:-
Bigger/adjustable dialogue boxes so you can see the file name.
Personal computers being ‘personal’ we all have one each now why can we not have a rapid start up, no need to load everything anybody could want straight away, load the essential things for the user and the rest on the fly.
Plain english error reporting with possible suggestion of problem.(less bugs would be better)

I must be the only perons in the universe who has never had a problem with Vista. My computer works faster than my old one did with XP and I have had zero problems with any hardware. Surely everyone has a wordprocessor whether it be Word or some open source program so why tinker with notepad? It is a very fast basic program that doesn’t need to be bloated with features the others have. I could go on but since I am 🙂 I will end here.

i here what all you people say about vista and no comment(….)xp terrific o/s shame its ending,windows 7 beta loaded as muti boot loaded every single program i had on xp boot, also vista as another boot loaded as xp ,all youseing same m/b ip35 pro.quad core 2.4 cpu.
xfx graphics card.4 gig crucial ram,quess what
u dont need a stopwatch to compare the speeds
7beta .xp .vista i just pray the final release
wont be to bloated will work well with new i7
intel systems quickkkkkkkkk

We still use Windows XP in our family – mostly for older Windows games. As we will probably purchase an XBox or PlayStation for newer games, we don’t see any need to upgrade to any of the latest Microsoft offerings.

All of our computers are set up to dual boot with our favourite Linux distribution (currently LinuxMint or Ubuntu). Both have matured and are updated frequently, plus they come with all the software that we need. My grandfather loves it, as he is comfortable doing a new install by himself.

I’d like to say a few more things about being more productive. If I programmed websites in NotePad I would have to spend time to save the website as a webpage, close my html file, and than open it in the browser. In my HTML edito I just click a tab to preview the website.

I have loaded Windows 7 64 Bit Beta and whilst it is very pretty, with no available Creative, HP or Canon drivers I have no sound, scanner or printer. Having managed to download iTunes it won’t connect to the iTunes Store and my playlists are not displayed. Windows Explorer won’t download FLash Player etc. therefore, some content won’t play either. Good job I took Microsofts advice and loaded on a separate partition to protect my good operating system. I am actually a fan of Vista but the 32 bit version not the 64 bit version which has real problems allowing other machines on my network to recognise the system printer which works really welll in 32 bit version. I have submitted all the problems to Microsoft, so lets see what they do with them. It occurs to me that Microsoft have asked us to do all the basic testing for them to save them the trouble. Not very impressed and will contnue with my excellent Vista 32 bit system, even though it does not recognise the 8gb of memory installed.

Personally I think it will be another pile of doggy doo from that now faceless corporation nolonger headed by its founder who’s just as dismayed by the monster he created as the users are!
It will make even more 3rd party aplications and general software rundundant and most likely even more hardware to follow suit when none of the current drivers work and are nolonger supported.
I’ve never personally favoured the pirates but the more I have to spend money I haven’t got to keep my software and hardware running the more they have my support and there fires the ever rapidly increasing market for it.
Mind you its been more than once the faceless corporation has admitted its secretly admits in some cases piracy increases its circulation and helps un-officially test its security.
The only losser yet again is you and me with a new OS no one wants but no doubt at some point will be forced to buy!!!

I think I would get more enjoyment from watching bill stick his head in a blender!

You call apple a good alternative. Mac is only good for running a single window. Problems occur when running more than one. Windows on the other hand is designed for running more than one window open at the same time. Also mac computers costs are outrageous. You talk bad about Microsoft and I’ve used freeware programming ides and freeware word processor and they both were trash. I couldn’t figure out how to get their stupid debugger to work. Microsoft’s Visual Studio 2008 Express Edition’s debugger worked just fine. As I said before you just complain and have no action and most of the people who complain about the standard software only do a little web surfing and games. They don’t use their computer for work.

Well I have been with windows sense the 3.1.1 for workgroups and built many, many machines.. Currently I am running Vista and XP on my laptop. I have to tell you I can’t stand all the little bs that Microsoft puts you through with all there damm versions of Vista.. COME ON!! What happened to my integrated FAX .. OO damm that is in Ultimate !! 🙁 What the hell.. MAKE ONE VERSION OR MAYBE TWO and GIVE US EVERYTHING WE PAID FOR.. So .. I am now going to be switching to MAC.. Faster and Much less stress.. MUCH more stable and can also run windows if I choose… So for all you guys out there wondering about Windows 7?? Don’t just switch to MAC PRO and run windows of your choice on it. I can tell you from experience that I had my MAC run for 9 months with not so much of a single crash or restart.. DAMM SOLID .. Thanks APPLE .. you have me now.. No more windows for me.. 🙂

Finally, do I really have an alternative – unfortunately no. None of the alternatives really allow me to live and thrive in a business world dominated by a monopoly. Sure I can run my website on Apache and sure there are open source alternatives to many applications, but if I really want to do business in most markets I am locked into Microsoft Windows and Office. I am not one of those that would claim that Linux or Apple is a reasonable alternative, it is more so now than it was a few years ago, and if Microsoft continues to overreach and to make mistakes the size of Vista we may not be 30 more years from a free-er market place. I just wish Microsoft would quit spending its time trying to preserve its monopoly and instead spend some of its time and massive resources on developing really new, really better, really faster and really higher performing alternatives.

In rereading my pending post, there are a few things I would like to clarify. First, I failed to acknowledge the outstanding advances in Data Storage, Graphics, Usable Memory, or the Speed and Density of Processors in what I will acknowledge was a rant. However, Microsoft is not responsible for the fact that I now have realistic art in games, have the ability to support huge, dense, monitors – I love my 24″ 1920×1200 30bit Monitor. I love having more storage than I could have imagined and being able to store high definition movies on my Hard Drive or for that matter on my DVR.
And I will readily acknowledge that the ability to address all that ram and to access all that storage is real improvement in my life.

My point in the hopefully above post if it ever gets out of moderation is that despite this massively improved hardware, graphics processing, hugely enlarged storage, that as far as my data – by that I mean the actual words I’ve typed in my word processor, the numbers and formulas, I’ve actually built in my spreadsheet and the data I’ve actually input into my database, that except for the available number of fields in the last, my world has not significantly improved from the days of Word Perfect, Lotus 123 and FoxPro back in the 80’s. Yes the files I save are many times far larger, and yes I can now have desktop access to far more files without going to archival storage, but, and this is a big but and the principle point of my prior post, My word processor really does not do any of its tasks any faster than it did 30+ years ago, my spreadsheet does not do many things any faster than it did 30+ years ago and for most reasonable accounting applications my database is not really any faster in terms of the time it takes me than it was 30+ years ago.

Yes the files are much bigger, but how much of that is really my data and how much of it is application and OS bloat. And my main point, to actually accomplish my tasks, for the most part, they take just as long and in some cases longer to accomplish than before despite massively improved hardware. And by masively improved I am talking about orders of magnitude improvement in speed, storage size, addressable memory and graphics processing.

But virtually none of this power accrues to my benefit in core business applications. I am only marginally more productive today than I was then and in all honesty, I am forced to do far more “OS Maintenance” and “Tinkering” then to even maintain an acceptable level of performance, then I did 30+ years ago on DOS. All that supposed “ease of use” has come at a significant cost in terms of productivity.

Yes the Internet is great and yes it offers new capabilities that are exciting and productive. But Microsoft was not the driver of the Internet and if anything remains an anchor on Internet Performance. Microsoft did not develop the high speed connections and networks that I now use, but it does seem to daily make them slower. And approximately 20 years ago I had Internet Video conferencing through ICQ and Internet Audio through a variety of sources and Hotmail was a small Israeli company that had garnered 10’s of millions (maybe even 100’s of millions of users) before Microsoft bought it and turned from it a dominant free email service to an also ran.

My point remains, I have seen worlds of improvement in hardware, and software, but very little of it has originated with Microsoft and Microsoft has killed many of the really innovative companies that once exisited and has turned what in the 1980’s was a wild frontier of ever emerging small software companies that were constantly pushing the envelope of what was possible, into a gaggle of game companies, a few massive software giants who wouldn’t recognize a real innovation if it bit them (at least until some upstart takes a big enough chunk of their market share that they decide they have to either buy them or steal their technology). And unfortunately there are fewer and fewer of those upstarts as it has gotten more and more expensive and time consuming to develop products around a bloated, ever shifting, closed dominant OS.

O.K. ….. LET’S CUT IT TO THE QUICK. YOU HAVE A CHILD AND HOPE FOR THE BEST. YOU’D LIKE THEM TO BECOME ACCOMPLISHED IN LIFE. BUT THAT IS A PIPE DREAM. THEY WILL FOLLOW THEIR OWN PATH IN LIFE AND BLOW YOUR DREAM APART, OR ENHANCE IT.
THERE ARE THOSE THAT STILL INSIST ON CARRYING THE VISTA TORCH, AND LET’S THROW IN IE7 ALSO. THE CHILDREN ARE OUTDATED, OUTMODED OR DEFECTIVE! WE WISH THEY WERE SOMETHING ELSE, BUT WE CAN’T CHANGE THAT.
WE NEED A NEW OS AND BROWSER. GOOGLE CHROME SEEMS TO BE A GOOD ALTERNATIVE TO IE7. THE CHILD IS STILL YOUNG ….. GIVE IT TIME TO DEVELOP INTO SOMETHING. IT LOADS FASTER, DOWNLOADS QUICKER AND IS MORE USER FRIENDLY.
AS FOR THE WINDOWS 7? IT PROBABLY IS JUST ANOTHER MICROSOFT FANTASY OR BAND-AID FOR A VERY BROKEN PRODUCT. I AM A SYSTEMS INTEGRATOR, AND QUITE HONESTLY, RELY ON TRACK RECORDS. BILL GATES AND MICROSOFT HAVE A VERY POOR TRACK RECORD. MONEY DRIVEN! I’M GOING TO WAIT AND SEE IF GOOGLE, OR SOMEONE ELSE, DEVELOPS A BETTER OS. PATIENCE IS A WONDERFUL VIRTUE. COULD ANDROID FOR PC’S & NOTEBOOKS BE NEXT?

I personally have never seent the point of word pad or note pad. Instead of using note pad to program websites I use an HTML editor that has web preview. I’ve encountered problems sure, but I spent the time to figure them out instead of gripping like you lazy complainers. That’s what it is. Plain lazyness. You preffer to just talk with no action. As far as I’m concerned you’re just a bunch of liars.

Shawn – u type ur com run faster – i like to know how u did it, i got 2Gb ram, 2Ghz, and 512 MB graf.
And i think my vista run slow.
And sometimes it crash or my programs stuck, and i have to reboot my com.

I keep reading from the MS Fanboys that Vista and/or Windows 7 is faster than or more stable than XP. My experience and I believe every other objective reviewer’s experience has been that on the same hardware that XP is MUCH faster than either Vista or 7. It is only when comparing XP on some 5 year old slug machine vs Vista or 7 on a much faster and much more powerful machine that it even comes close to being or is faster than XP.

Bloat has been the problem with Windows almost since inception and as Microsoft has added Millions of lines of code it has slowed the systems down more and more over the years. Also XP has been in the last few years made slower and slower itself as Microsoft has added “Critical Security Updates”. As you continue to add lines of code and new processes to windows it gets slower and slower and requires more and more hardware to maintain minimally acceptable levels of performance. I do not want any new features, I want features stripped, or made optional. I would really like to see what today’s hardware would do with a tightly written, minimal OS which has been optimized for speed and performance rather than for features I neither need nor want.

My wish list is simple, a tightly coded, minimal base OS with all the bells and whistles included as optional but tightly written and coded modules that can be added or not entirely at the User’s option. I would like no browser included in the OS base module and completely open and transparent code so the market place could decide what it wanted as a browser. Bundle all the optional modules you want but make the Core OS completely open and accessible so that any company or developer can write its own competing optional modules. Microsoft used Windows to force Office on the world by breaking their competitors applications with every update so as to force them to constantly rewrite their code and to cause their products to repeatedly fail so consumers were left no option but Word, Excel, etc.

The reason Windows is such a mess to day is because Microsoft was not effectively reigned in during the Anti-Trust years and was allowed to continue its monopolistic practices which has allowed Microsoft to continue to offer bloated, half-finished products and force users to accept them. The markets reaction to Vista has actually forced Microsoft to minimally adjust, but until people demand the performance their new computers should be giving them and until Microsoft is forced by either the market or by the Anti-Trust Laws either here or in Europe to open the core OS code up, Windows will always be an anchor designed to tie you to Microsoft’s Application programs.

That and Copy Protection which is another of the principle causes of bloat and unreliability of the OS and which many of us thought we had finally beaten back in the 1980’s when we forced Word Perfect, Lotus, Ashton Tate and even Microsoft for a while to abandon by as users refusing to buy products that included any form of copy protection.

Yes pirating is an issue, but in the 1980’s many very successful companies proved that fair prices and better performance led to improved sales of products stripped of copy protection and other built-in malware.

Is Microsoft evil, maybe, maybe not, but certainly many of the decisions it has made and the courses it has taken have been far from beneficial to the computing community and most have not even been benign and have actually been damaging. I find it sad that 30 years later we are still fighting the same dragons and that for actual productive work my new quadcore system with more than a Terabyte of storage and 16 GBs of ram is as slow or slower performing spreadsheet or word processing applications as a PCAT running MSDOS, Word Perfect and Lotus 123 was 30 plus years ago. And that was with 40MB of storage and 2MBs of Ram and with a processor that was measured in Mhz not GHz.

I pray that someday we can actually harness the horsepower of the newest PCs to actually be objectively more productive.

I have been using Vista since inception from beta stage. I have relatively few problems. I have used both 32 & 64 bit. 64 bit I do not recommend as manufacturers are slow to produce 64bit software. Windows explorer does constantly restart and Dreamscene/Deskscapes has a similar problem the screen goes black you then have to restart Dreamscene.
I have the maximum amount of memory 4gb which is all 32bit can use, perhaps Microsoft can improve this. I running windows 7 beta which seems to be a vast improvement in speed, but Dreamscene is not installed so I cannot compare speed fairly.
All in all I trust MS will give a much cheaper upgrade to Vista users for Windows 7.

To me the worst thing about Vista is the obvious focus on corporate IT departments as users – rather than on the ordinary home user. The original dream back in 1983 or so was that now we could compute without being slaves of some overlord. With Vista, MS went whole hog for central control.

I hope Windows 7 will be more appropriate for individuals. Corporate IT departments can keep Vista (although I think they didn’t universally go for it).

There are other features that Windows 7 should address. Most of these featues are available from other freeware sites. 1.Revo Uninstaller to replace Microsofts Add/Remove. CCleaner which is more efficent than anything Microsoft offers. The list goes on and on about what works and we download to supplement Microsofts Operating Systems

To the sorry sap that thinks that because MS is continuing XP support is because of problems with vista, wake up. It is all about money. Sad, but true. They have an opportunity to make more money because of ignorant people thinking vista is no good and then they pay more to downgrade to an inferior OS in XP. It is too bad that MS is doing this but when you deal with ignorance I guess that is their problem.

I’ve been using Vista on my laptop for well over a year now, and comparing it to my other 6 year old laptop (XP) and the XP desktop I built last year, as well as several other operating systems I’ve had the pleasure of using, I have to say that Windows ME is the worst OS ever. Vista is a CLOSE 2nd. This Vista laptop lags up for a moment nearly every 15 seconds, crashes randomly, takes over 8 minutes to boot up and over 4 minutes to shut down. Mind you, I’ve been using computers since the early DOS days, and I’ve tried every version of Windows from 3.1 to Vista.

I too have upgraded to vista (clean install). I love it. No network problems, never crashed in over a year (XP crashed three times in same amount of time). Yes you need more memory, but if you examine memory dollar for dollar, it is cheaper now to get 4 GB of Ram than it was to get 512 back when XP was starting out. I run a Dell 530s with the E2160 dual core and 2 GB of RAM. It is plenty fast… I just upgraded to the 64 bit and it is much faster! I like the interface and I think that MS has it right pushing WME. I have started building home theater systems with it and customers LOVE IT! It seems as if Vista is a stepping stone to wonderful things in the future for operating systems.
BTW, my first computer was a Timex Sinclair also (built it from a Heath Kit) And have had everything from Commodores to apples to tandys and what I have now is fine with me.
Cya
J

Try printing from a Vista pc over the network when the host pc is XP. Can’t do it… (unless the host pc logs on with the same user/password) and that ain’t happnin’. This is utter BS to me. My son has Vista and I hate it. If I need to fix a problem I have to experiment around to find things because of the totally different interface.

I acually Like windows Vista. I didnt like it at first. it crashed, it was to slow, i hate the new windows vista defragment program. it takes 10 hrs to defrag. there are better versions on the web though for free if you look for them such as Auslogics disk defrag.
when i first got vista i was like yuck i hate this program. but i found this driver detective. alot of people said it was a waist of my time. so i asked them if i could try it if i like it i would buy it. i got it there were 24 files that needed updating icluding my motherboard. motherboard i dont even know how to upgrade that with software. but it did something and updated stuff i thought windows update would take care of…. my computer runs like a beast. they have to get better programs into vista to make it a better running program.
why change to 7 just work on getting vista better???? no?

I just installed the last beta MS put out of Windows 7 64-bit and I love it even if there aren’t drivers for everything yet.With an old Asus M2N32-SLI mobo and an AMD 6400+ dual-core proc with 2gb of memory it’s fast as hell compared to XP Pro in 32 bit. I’m going to start saving to finally build a totally new 64-bit computer when the public final release hits the market.

Hi Bruce,
If you look at the article, the only place where I was asking for more features was in Notepad. That’s not really bloat in my view.

Most of the other things on the wish list were things that were working right in XP that are no longer working well in Vista.

The only exception would be Windows Movie Maker, which I think is strategic since this is where Apple is leading. The key thing that I want from Windows 7 more than anything else is for it to be successful. I am still rooting for Windows and Microsoft because it is in my blood.

I don’t know what the writer is talking about. I have three computers running Vista. One 32 Bit and two with 64 bit. The only problem I’ve had is loading up SP1 on the the 32 bit machine. We just skipped it for now.

Networking, my cousin prints everything off her 32 bit Dell. The printer is connected to an HP 64 bit computer on our network and it prints in seconds. In fact the only problem she ever had was with her old XP machine and the XP desktop that was our network hub. Switched every thing over to Vista and it works great.

As for movie maker, the only problem I had is it saying a seventeen minute clip is too big. I generally use DIVX Author and half the time, after waiting over an hour for it to finish, I find only half the sound.

NEVER had any problem with playing music. I’ve edited, played music, and scanned the internet at the same time with few problems.

I red a lot of all what is written here. I use Vista since 2007 and since that time I never felt happy with my pc. This is my 4th computer since 1997. I loved XP. With Vista I have a lot of problems …still going on….and now I have to pay again for Windows 7??? Microsoft….to get a good name…..give all Vista users Windows XP back (free) or….when Windows 7 is good….give them that version for FREE. Then we can say…..hmmmmm Microsoft is not that bad!!!! Besides…..I am a woman of 70 years old who learned herself everything on the pc without a course!!

I just saw Windows 7 yesterday, and didn’t see much different, but I didn’t have time to go through it all.
However, I agree with some of the comments above. My Dad always put the Christmas up and got it stable before we started decorating it. Microsoft is putting too much effort into the decorations, and not enough into the basic stability of the operating system.

I haven’t had many problems with Vista, but for the life of me, I don’t understand some of the changes, which seem to be change for change sake, not to improve anything. The biggest problem I have with it is the constant need to confirm/approve tasks, and to start things with the “Run as Administrator” when I am the admin! I fail to see why they couldn’t have simply put a “Remember this decision” checkbox so I only have to do it once per program that requires it.

I would like to see Windows 7 come delivered without all the extras – let them be free downloads, but let me decide which of them I want. I don’t have a problem with Notepad, but they could certainly take Wordpad up to include spellcheck – I teach Seniors to use computers and, for most of them, that would be all they need. The compatibility issues of Vista remain the biggest single problems, and they aren’t all Microsoft – other companies decided to vote themselves more money by not supporting Vista for their existing equipment so you would buy a new machine. I have seen printers that were less than 2 years old which were incompatible with Vista – those are companies I won’t deal with again!

So in summary, my hopes for Windows 7 would be more speed, stability, compatibility (at least with everything Vista can run, but ideally with everything XP was able to run), and meaningful error messages that the user can actually do something about. It drives me crazy to get a crash, report it, and find the “Crash caused by a device driver” message – surely Windows can tell which device driver failed, and then let me in on the secret!
I’m still running XP as my desktop, so when I replace it, I’ll have to choose whether to go with Vista or wait for Windows7 — I’m watching!

I don’t want them to improve Notepad. In Windows 95 – Windows 98 SE (I never used 2000 so I don’t know) you were allowed to substitute another text editor for Notepad. There are wonderful freeware text editors available on the Internet and you could bring them up when you double-clicked any .txt file. That was an option. It’s not an option in XP or Vista. I don’t want some slightly improved piece of garbage version of Notepad. I want the ability to do what the old OSs allowed – pick from the others. This is like the days of DOS when smart users used Vernon Berg’s program “List” which was a text editor first and the best Swiss Army Knife next. So Microslop came out with a text editor in DOS 5. Big deal, comparing that to “List” was like comparing a horse and buggy to a multi-purpose jet.

MP3 ID3 Tag Support PLEASE!!!
I tried the 64 bit systems, both XP & Vista only to find that neither supported MP3 ID3 tag support in explorer. I just can’t believe they left that out. I would have to guess that 99% of users out there use their PC for music downloads transfers and play back. GPS, phones, and all these audio/video players are updated and managed through the pc and most use explorer for that purpose. I have well over 500GB of music and audio books and could not manage them with the 64bit systems. All my track ones, literally tens of thousands, were followed by all my track twoâ€™s, then my track threeâ€™s so on and so on. I had to switch back to 32bit and 3.5 GB of usable memory. Wakeup Microsoft!!!

I Like Notepad the way it is, simple plain text editor, as mentioned by another contributer, ideal for running of quick html.
CLose tags function would be nice but then again would that make me lazy and stop me checking for other silly errors.

I run XP, I like it, had a lot of trouble at first but it eventually settled.

I didnt update to vista, doubt I will update 7. to be honest I can’t afford to keep upgrading every couple of years so as long as what I’ve got does what I want I’ll stick with it.

Have been tinkering around with the Windows 7 beta. The potential to create a decent operating system is there. I am not a Windows user and really don’t intend to be.

That is of course unless they “remove” all the things that are not needed. That would be Internet Explorer, Windows mail, Windows Media Player, Windows Photo Viewer, Windows Movie Maker, and all the added junk. It is just that, “junk”!

If they offer it as an operating system only, and leave it up to the end user what applications they want and don’t want, I may consider buying a copy when it is released.

The last version of Windows I purchased was Windows 2000 professional, it was as close to what an operating system should be or rather as MS was/is capable of producing, a platform to run the applications you want. It even had a few things I didn’t want, but when compared to all of its predecessors, it was as close to a bare bones system MS will ever produce.

That said, it looks as though Rob Cheng is looking for more bloat and useless junk to be added to replace the current bloat and useless junk.

Rob you disappoint me, I didn’t figure you for one to want the crap that MS forces down it’s users throats.

Guys, let’s get one thing straight here at the outset of this posting: Vista is NO SLOWER THAN XP. In fact, at most things, it is FASTER than XP, and that is not hyperbole: that is fact, backed up by using a stopwatch on common tasks in both Vista and XP.

Now, as to the ‘Explorer needs to restart’ thing in Vista…. never seen that, ever. I have had to restart Explorer manually (usually because I was suspicious that it had gotten malware in it), but I’ve never had it have to automatically restart.

As to Windows Movie Maker… yes, it was a piece of crap, to be blunt. I got that “Windows Movie Maker has stopped working!” message more times than I could COUNT…. that’s the main reason why I stopped using it and started using Boilsoft’s software for the very little movie-making (usually video joining) that I needed to do.

Networking….. all of those problems that the article writer mentions, I haven’t had. Vista networking is faster than XP networking (by Magnitudes), it automatically sees EVERYTHING on my other 2 Vista PC’s and even my mothballed XP machine when I have it out, and when I use network printing, it only takes one MILLI-SECOND to start printing.
If the article writer is REALLY having it take 5 minutes to start printing on a network printer…. there is something wrong with his network printer or it needs firmware updates bad.

Now, there are a few things that I have a beef with Windows 7 about: 1. They borked up the sleep function somehow. I don’t understand it, but whenever I try to resume from sleep….. I cannot get back into Windows 7, I just have a totally blank screen.
2. There is a serious issue between Google Chrome and Windows Defender. When they are both running at the same time, you get a Blue Screen, and it’s reproducible. This should have been caught BEFORE Windows 7 went out for Beta testing.
3. There are a few incompatibilities with older programs and Windows 7, especially with programs that add links to the right-click menu.

Other than those three relatively minor annoyances…. I haven’t found any problems with Windows 7 that are serious, save that Blue-screen issue.

Huh? I’ve found Vista’s networking to be far superior to XP’s. Methinx you need to look at your router/network switch.
As for what need to be included in the Vista bugfix known as Windows 7? Easy. Native Blu Ray support. I will not even consider this “upgrade” until MS admits to it’s bad bet with HDDVD and includes Blu Ray support in Media Center.

No operating system is absolutely perfect. When I first upgraded from Win ME to XP, I was hugely impressed despite the fact that a lot of things didn’t work correctly for me initially. It was eventually fixed and the OS was great. Then Vista’s beta came and I tried it out, and hated it. Full version of Vista was a different story. It worked well, but just like XP, it had issues at the outset. When push came to shove though, I definitely preferred Vista to XP and it was even faster in my experience. Note that any time I’ve upgraded my OS, I’ve kept the old OS available as a dual boot option until all the bugs were worked out. Did it with ME to XP and XP to Vista. I’ve downloaded the betas (32 and 64 bit) and started playing around with them a bit and so far, the OS is looking great. Maybe it will be good enough that I won’t find the need to dual boot? 😉

If whining improves an attitude, there should be some very pleasant folks around here. I run Vista on three computers: one desktop running Vista Ultimate 32-bit; one desktop running Vista Ultimate 64-bit; and a laptop running Vista Ultimate 32-bit, on a network. I print to three different printers and the speed is just fine. The computers are stable and the printing from the laptop is wireless through a LinkSys router. Vista is far better than XP for me; I can’t think of anything to whine about.

Maybe I’m just lucky, but I installed Vista the day it was released and can’t relate to any of the negative comments I have read and heard. Not quite as quick as my XP machine but with 2GB DDR, very do-able. My only gripe is that both times that I tried to install SP1, the first subsequent update threw me into BSOD. Video driver issue, I believe…so I’ll just skip SP1 till I get a new video card or maybe I’ll just go to Windows 7.

I don’t mind vista but i do prefer xp but i only went up to vista for the media center which i have the remote for. If xp had it i would have stayed with it. Plus 64bit half the drivers out there that they say work never do.

What’s going to be so good about Windows 7? Vista works perfectly for me so I don’t see why I should have to fork out another $300 for Windows 7. Microsoft have to offer good reason to upgrade other than a GUI touchup but I’m afraid that’s all Windows 7 will be – a new name with a slightly different graphics expression and maybe less stringent hardware requirements but it is really ‘Vista redone’ or Vista 2nd Edition and nothing more.

It seems no matter what, there are many ignorant people who will blame a company for everything that goes wrong with their computers, even when the most current operating system to date from an excellent company is Vista. I have ran Vista Ultimate with SP1 for 11 months now and am truly happy with this operating system. I have FOUR computers I built from scratch, and I know countless others who use Vista with no problems whatsoever. 99 percent of problems as I have said in the past are the consumer and hardware/software manufacturers who either choose not to keep up-to-date or are lazy in doing so. When version 7 comes out which is just an upgraded version of Vista thankfully, you should still do a fresh erase of your hard drive and a FULL VERSION, NON-BETA install when it is released. Any smart computer person knows that no matter what operating system you use, all important or relevant data and programs should be backed up to DVD/Blu-Ray backup media and/or an external e-SATA hard drive, so that when they do a yearly erase and fresh reinstall or to the newest version of Windows (which you should always do), then you will have the data in the right place. Don’t blame Microsoft. It is not their fault when they are just trying to be more secure and more up-to-date and contemporary even when some people are not. Also use Windows Update, Norton Internet Security 2009 and PC Pitstop Optimize and PC Pitstop MD, and you will see that your computer will run right and smoothly day after day. Either stay current, or fall behind. It is YOUR choice.

Outlook express within vista needs to be modified, so that individual *.dbx files can be imported.
Currently, if you have some old files, you cannot import them into the outlook express, so they are a new accessible sub folder.
The new windows 7 should have this feature added.

I ran XP for years with very little problems. My Vista machine does not like the NVida drivers in my HP laptop and in full screen steaming video will crash every time. Sad.

My sister’s Vista machine is so bad it won’t even run internet explorer! I had to put Firefox on it so she could use the internet! Totally sad. I couldn’t even look at the Microsoft website for help because the browser help crashing. What crap. You Vista users keep praising this waste of code. Give me XP anytime. If Vista is so good, why did Microsoft extend support for XP and start allowing retailers to start selling brand new XP machines again?

I like Notepad too for its simplicity. There are plenty of easy to use substitutes that are more powerful, but for the simple it is GREAT!

I watch TV or get DVD’s for movies, so I have no need for the movie side of things. In this economic climate however, that might well change.

Have had isses with Windows Explorer restarting once in a while, but it has not been a headache, but it would be nice if O/S’s touted as being so wonderful were a little less prone to these kinds of failures.

I note that a lot of my software is NOT approved by M/S for my system. Yet, I cannot find a satisfactory method to learn how to get it okayed! So I use it anyway.

Drivers were the main issue. I purchased a Dell System, and had Dell wireless adapters. When Vista came out, they were suppose to run on that O/S. After over a year of hounding them I learned that new drivers were NOT forthcoming. So I had to purchase different ones…. even those were not reliable. So I believe the networking of wireless devices needs a complete investigation to make them more user friendly.

I have children so controlling their access to the internet was an issue, and the User accounts offered some pretty nice controls. However, software makers were not able to get their products to work well in a controlled environment or across the network. I blame that on the software companies though, not on Vista.

In this economic climate, however, I think it would be wise of M/S to make certain that their latest offering (7.0) is affordable to those of us that popped the nearly $400 per copy to have their Win Vista Ultimate. Atleast until our portion of the Federal Bail out gets to us!!

I have to say dito with the most of the problems already mentioned, except the networking. I purchased an HP Slimline, with Vista (now Vista Sp1) and the HP Media Smart TV. WOW. Both came with their own remote control and they work seamlessly. I can download a movie and stream it direct to the TV (wireless), while it is being saved to the HD. When I task the TV to open a file on the PC for viewing, I have no problems using the PC. Of course I have to give credit to HP for putting this altogether, they got it right. Ture Vista is a dissapointment on some levels but from what I have read so far I am in no hurry to load Windows 7.

I have resisted Vista until Christmas, when I was given a brand new laptop with Vista installed. After three weeks, I have decided that I like it. I also downloaded W-7 and am trying to run it inside Virtual PC. I think I’m going to like W-7 once I get the bugs worked out of the Virtual PC. Maybe Microsoft is finally headed in the right direction.

I am VERY DISSAPOINTED with the new Windows 7. I wwas hoping like everyone else that there would be something new and exciting here, but alas there is not. The only thing new here is where Microsoft fixed what should have been done with Vista in the first place. Other than changing the looks of some icons it even looks like Vista. Granted it does operate better and faster than Vista does, but what do you expect when you optimize the code the should have been done in the first place. And one big factor you have to remember this is still using the same kernal as Vista does, So how can they call this Windows 7 when all it is, is a correction/fix for what Vista was supposed to be!

I’ve been running W7 64 bit for a few days now.
Must admit initial impression is that it’s quicker than vista 64. Had a small issue with the HP 64 bit driver for a laserjet 2500 it just wouldn’t download. Eventually used Vista to get it and shoved it over.

My hard wired/wireless and NAS are all happy with it but you do seem to have lost immediate control of your network as this homegroup takes it out of your hands and I’m still trying to find all the bits!

I have 3 machines on XP 32 two on vista 64 and one dual booting V64/W7. IMHO V64 is the most stable Op Sys yet. Can’t say we’ve had any IE issues other than IE8 beta seemed not to get on with XP32 but appears fine on W7. My kids have been running AOC and COD 4 on V64 with no snags. I was also very impressed with V64’s repair option as I had never used it before normally relying on images for backup. However, when all else failed gave it a go and it worked a treat. Final comment, I used to enjoy being able to patch repair 3.1 when it went snafu, type sysedit and all was revealed. However we do need to move on, I haven’t tried running a couple of CAD’s, Word and a browser on XP32 at the same time lately but I expect V64 would have the edge!

hey there Jg007,in yer musings bout wether or not they might/not give much back on a vista copy towards the win.7,Do you speak from real knowledge or just what they(corpRATypes) usually do?…I don’t doubt yer sincerety,but i JUST..only a matter of days ago paid a healthy bit of change for a laptop that came with Vista64 on it.Was wondering if you think that considerations may be given as to how RECENTLY you were “forcably befriended” by Vista..i mean..it would seem to me the more recently you just shelled out for the product,IE:the latest folks to buy vista,would be the ones to get a better deal on the upgrade to win.7..,be it sliding scale or what-
ever means of comping’em!…ya think? I dunno hope some one does!

I installed my first vista, 21st feb 07, having first upgraded the computer components to handle vista. I had UAC turned off probably in the first hour of use, it quickly became the best os ever. no problems whatsoever even a little bit. Am now testing Windows 7 beta, and it is like a new kind of crime and punishment, the crime – daring to turn off UAC, the punishment – no gadgets. I kind of wonder if 7 will appease the savage vista haters, I doubt it.

This is my first Vista machine, and although I paid extra to get the xp discs, so far (3 months) I’m happier with Vista than XP. Vista has only crashed once. XP crashed daily. Faster or slower I can’t tell, since this machine is faster and has more memory.
But they better fix windows explorer, or whatever it is that saves files and finds them.

For some reason, it cannot remember the date modified, and takes you to weird places every time you want to save a file. I can be working on a bulletin that incorporates graphs and pictures, that I save to the same folder as the bulletin to keep it all together, and every picture I save it wants to put in pictures or documents.

“The CPU was rated at 3.00 MegHz”
Maybe that’s why you had so many problems? 😛 Just a typo, I know.

Personally, I’ve never touched Windows Movie Maker – I’ve always found better free alternatives or happened to have access to slightly better programs like Adobe Premiere. I do think it’s important to have a solid base of reliable and relatively functional applications that less technical users can utilize reliably and intuitively, so as for having a broader appeal, I do think improving Movie Maker would be a good thing.
With Networking, while I haven’t used it for quite the same things as the author here, I’ve found it to be quite a bit easier to connect to new networks on the fly. Me and my friends will often throw up ad hoc networks to play LAN games on with little to no problems.
With regards to the “Windows Explorer is Restarting” issue, it’s something I’ve only had happen to me twice in the past two years, so I’d hardly call it something to be concerned about – especially since it doesn’t cause any damage. The concept of increased system stability though, is one I’ll definitely stand behind. Certainly, it would be better if I had never seen that notice even once, and that’s what Microsoft should be shooting for.
Notepad isn’t something I really use, as I’m not a programmer and don’t really tend to need it for anything in particular. In this case, I’ll simply defer to the author’s criticisms.
Speed I think is the key factor here. You can add all the bells and whistles you want to the OS, but if it runs like crap on a majority of the computers in the world, then it really doesn’t matter. 512MB of RAM and a 2.0GHz Pentium 4 should be the minimum requirements for all OS’s to run on. Maybe you’ll have to turn off the transparent, flashy glass aesthetics, the smooth-looking animations and random epic sound effects, but it should still run smoothly and with most new features still in tact in one form or another at those specs.

ok – vista is terrible and XP was great ‘cept that if you like XP, keep it, and download the transformation packages available to make XP look like Vista. Vista does have some new and eye pleasing icons and window dressings. I’ve converted 3 PC’s and have found that they look better and seem to run a bit quicker, too, I might add. Wait until Windows 7 has been around awhile before jumping into a new OS. My $0.02.

@ Linda, Sorry but I think it is unlikely you will be able to get that cheap an upgrade and although you will definitely be able to upgrade you will probably end up paying approx Â£80 ( sorry not sure on US price ) at least for it

firstly Vista with SP1 is no where near as bad as you make out, I don’t run it because I don’t like pirated software and can’t afford to upgrade but I do know and have spoken to plenty of people both tech enthusiasts and everyday users who love it and would never go back to XP .

Every system is different and people sometimes forget that the software that THEY install from 3rd party company’s can cause many of the problems and instead just blame it all on MS.

Also too many people sit and talk about the good old days of XP, yes XP was a good release but eventually you will need to change to a newer OS and when that happens some things will look and be different and may be in different places to XP

I have been playing with Windows 7 Beta 1(Yes BETA 1 – remember that!) and am pretty impressed.

I play a lot of older games so have installed 32 bit but so far it has been great I have had very few issues . When dual booting back to XP it just looks awful and outdated and feels much slower and clunkier than Windows 7.

Please , try out Windows 7 yourself when it is released and don’t just take silly hearsay and opinions from people who just enjoy bashing MS products

To all you vista haters. I just don’t understand what the problem is. Some say they know computers. If you really knew computers you would love Vista. It is more stable than XP and in my eyes much better. I don’t find Vista to be any slower than XP. In fact I have done testing and have found no sign of it. Most of it is in your heads. I have used the beta of Windows 7 and it is the same thing as Vista with just a couple of changes. I like it too but no better than Vista. I understand change is hard for some but give me a break. Let XP die. It has outlived its usefulness. If the world would have been like some of you people unwilling to change we would still be reading by candle light.

Pretty much ditto what Gary Wigle said – I just bought a new Dell laptop – the laptop is great but Vista spoils the fun of using it – it’s two weeks old and now just sits in my wardrobe whilst I have gone back to my seven year old PC running XP sp2. My Christmas present to myself of the new Dell spoiled by Vista. I’ve asked Dell if I can ‘upgrade’ to XP but so far have had no reply from them. So I sit here with a reliable old friend (XP) and do what I like to do on computers, using MS Office 2003 Pro using Excel, Acess and Word.
P.S. The Dell is my 23rd computer since 1979, starting with C/PM os machine and Sinclair ZX80. and I’m nearly 70 myself. Bring back XP I say(and my youth if possible!)

Gosh, almighty, now we have to keep up with Windows 7. That means I lose Windows XP. What about the new Internet Explorer 8. Gosh almighty again, now what do we do? What’s better to upgrade, keep windows XP and upgrade to Internet Explorer 8, or vice verse? What a mix up!! For sure, if you upgrade to both, Win 7 and IE 8, you’re gonna crash your computer, make a mess of other programs and curse the day you tried to upgrade.

I will be getting a new computer in 2009. For the very first time I might get an Apple. My last new computer was a Vista machine with a dual core Intel CPU. The CPU was rated at 3.00 MegHz. It now sits alone collecting dust. Just wasn’t good as my XP (now 5 years old) which has a Pentum 4 rated a 3.2 MHz. Who knows…maybe I will keep this machine. It seems to be the best out there. So far it does everything I ask of it. Should anyone ask more of a machine?

I bought a new laptop with Vista loaded on it. Haven’t had any problems (yet), but was wondering if people who purchased Vista will be able to upgrade to Windows 7 or are we stuck with Vista? Thanks…..

Letâ€™s hope MS getâ€™s more right, but face it there most likely will not be a perfect OS in our lifetime. Iâ€™m sure there will be wish list after every OS, when the wish lists stop we will have reached the top end of technology and only then will have the ability to achieve the perfect OS. This will never happen. As far as network printing goes, it takes me no longer to print over my network in Vista than it did with XP. If it takes 5 minutes to print a single page word document I would have to believe there is a problem with your network.

I find Windows 7 64 bit too much like Vista only worse. It has a good range of drivers but they dont work very well and it refuses to except the proper drivers to do the job. It really screws my Palit Radeon HD4870 Sonic Dual graphics card up. My HP Photosmart C5180 CAT5 network all in one printer, works as Windows Office printer and it doesn’t see the scanner. My computer is an Asus M3A79 Deluxe, with an AMD Phenom 9850 and 8 Gb RAM. I use XP 64 bit SP2 and my wish is they could bring out something better than this excellent OS.

@jvd897 – your video displays the true failure of Vista: it shows a bunch of revolutionary features promised for 2003, while Vista came out in 2007 and barely included any of the innovations shown in the video.

Windows Movie Maker: this program is actually being removed for Windows 7, and it’ll be replaced with a freely downloadable Windows Live Movie Maker, which is in beta right now, and looks almost like a complete rewrite. Thing is, Microsoft is detaching programs like this, Calendar, and Mail from Windows so that they can be updated more frequently…plus people seemed to think that they were what made Vista bloated.http://download.live.com/moviemaker

Networking: not sure if the networking stack will be changed (in fact, my guess is that it won’t be since 7 uses Vista’s driver model), but Microsoft is changing the front-end for home networking in a relatively significant way. They’ve introduced the concept of a “HomeGroup”, as opposed to a workgroup, which will home network resources easier to configure and more visible. In a great move for simplicity, HomeGroups can be set up during Windows Setup.

Windows Explorer: I’ve had this issue a few times on one of my computers, albeit a secondary one. It’s worth noting, however, that Windows Explorer is not the “guts” of Windows; it’s the skin, or the face. For example, recently I had an experience where Explorer in XP got corrupted and I was still able to access the computer over the network in order to do a quick backup.

Notepad: I actually happen to like Notepad the way it is — quick and simple, perfect for quick notes and bits of HTML. Anything more complex might be an anti-trust concern. However, Microsoft is changing Wordpad quite a bit this time around, and it looks essentially like a stripped-down version of Word 2007, which can’t really be said of the current Wordpad versus Word 6-2003.

Performance: At PDC, Steven Sinofsky showed off his demo version of Windows 7, and then informed the crowd that it was running on a netbook. The nice thing here is, when Vista was developed, it was basically developed from the ground up in a more modular way, and in Windows 7 we’re starting to see the fruits of this labour.

The Next Big Thing: I think I might have to disagree with your idea that the vision for Vista was worse than the outcome. Take a look at this video for instance:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9ifQvQCO7Y
I’m a Vista fan myself, but this would have seemed very revolutionary at the time, and it still looks rather impressive today, if a bit complex.

Anyways, a lot of this information has been around for a while, but I thought I should post it for the benefit of all. Thanks for the venue for discussion!